Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol III (1901).djvu/461

 strong language in a demand for reparation. A vexatious dispute followed between the two governments, and the queen and the prince were displeased by the manner in which the English ministers handled it. The queen wisely avoided all open expression of opinion, but shrewdly observed that, ' although foreign governments were often violent and arbitrary, our people are apt to give offence and to pay no regard to the laws of the country.' The discussion was gradually dropped, and when, on 2 Jan. 1861, the death of the paralysed Frederick William IV placed the queen's friend, the prince-regent of Prussia, finally on the throne of Prussia as King William I, and her son-in-law and her daughter then became crown prince and princess, the queen believed that friendship between the two countries, as between the two courts, was permanently assured. Her wrath with Napoleon, too, was waning. A private visit to Windsor and Osborne from the Empress Eugenie, who had come in search of health, revived the tie of personal affection that bound her to the queen, and the new year (1861) saw the customary interchange of letters between the queen and Napoleon III. English and French armies had been engaged together in China. But the main burden of the queen's greeting to the emperor was an appeal for peace.

A further source of satisfaction sprang from the second visit which Prince Louis of Hesse paid to Windsor in November 1860, when he formally betrothed himself to Princess Alice (30 Nov.)

Christmas and New Year 1860-1 were kept at Windsor with unusual spirit, although the death of Lord Aberdeen on 14 Dec. was a cause of grief. Among the many guests were both Lord Palmerston and Mr. Disraeli with his wife. The queen and prince had much talk with Disraeli, of whose growing influence they took due account, and they were gratified by his assurance that his followers might be relied on to support a national policy. On more personal questions he was equally complacent. He readily agreed to support the government in granting a dowry of 30,000l. and an annuity of 3,000l. to Princess Alice on her approaching marriage. On 4 Feb. 1861 the queen opened parliament in person, and herself announced the happy event. It was the last occasion on which she delivered with her own voice the speech from the throne. On 10 Feb. she kept quietly at Buckingham Palace the twenty-first anniversary of her marriage. 'Very few,' she wrote to her uncle Leopold, 'can say with me that their husband at the end of twenty-one years is not only full of the friendship, kindness, and affection which a truly happy marriage brings with it, but of the same tender love as in the very first days of our marriage.' But death was to destroy the mainspring of her happiness within the year.

The queen passed to the crowning sorrow of her life through a lesser grief, which on its coming tried her severely. On 16 March of the her mother, who kept her youthful spirit and cheerfulness to the last, and especially delighted in her grandchildren, died at Frogmore after a brief illness. It was the queen's first experience of death in the inmost circle of her family. Princess Alice, who was with her at the moment, first gave proof of that capacity of consolation which she was often afterwards to display in her mother's future trials. Although she was much broken, the queen at once sent the sad news in her own hand to her half-sister, to the princess royal, and to King Leopold. Expressions of sympathy abounded, and the general sentiment was well interpreted by Disraeli, who said in his speech in the House of Commons, in seconding a vote of condolence : 'She who reigns over us has elected, amid all the splendours of empire, to establish her life on the principle of domestic love.'

The duchess's body was laid on 25 March in St. George's Chapel, Windsor. The queen resolved that a special mausoleum should be built at Frogmore for a permanent burial-place, and the remains were removed thither on 17 Aug. The queen's behaviour to all who were in any way dependent on her mother was exemplary. She pensioned her servants ; she continued allowances that the Duchess of Kent had made to the Princess Hohenlohe and her sons Victor and Edward Leiningen. To the duchess's lady-in-waiting, Lady Augusta Bruce, sister of Lord Elgin, who had shown great devotion, the queen was herself much attached, and she at once made her her own bed-chamber woman in permanent attendance upon her.

The mourning at court put an end for the ; time to festivities, and some minor troubles, added to the queen's depression. In May, when Prince Louis of Hesse visited Osborne, he fell ill of measles. On 14 July the queen was shocked by news of the attempted assassination at Baden of her friend the king of Prussia. But she gradually resumed the hospitalities and activities of public life. Before the end of the season she entertained the king of the Belgians and the crown prince and princess of Prussia, the king and